The Weight of Life After Death: An Elegy for the Wanting
by TEP Redux
Summary: The afterlife is not what Kyle thought it would be. As he gets used to his new existence, Kyle discovers that he has a special gift. As he wanders the earth among the living, will he use his abilities for good or evil? Rated T for language, strong thematic elements, and mild sexual situations.
1. Chapter 1

_Hi there! First of all, thank you to everyone who reviewed my first story, _The Limits of Good Intentions_. It's been nice getting back into _South Park_ FF, both as a writer and reader, and I appreciate the support I've received so far since my recent return to this site._

_This story will be a serial, and I have only fleshed out future installments broadly, so your feedback might also help to determine what happens next._

_Happy readings!_

_TEPR_

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><p>To my surprise, the first person I saw was Craig. It was in his bedroom, and he looked worse than I had ever seen him before. He had not been in school for the last couple of months, and now it was apparent: lymphoma. I'm not sure how or why I knew that, but I did. I didn't have to ask him or his parents, nor did I have to consult the medical records that I inexplicably knew were in the second drawer of his parents' bureau, on the left, under two of his dad's grimy undershirts and a pocketknife. I just knew, and that was more unsettling than anything else. What did I, a fifteen year-old, know about cancer?<p>

I guess I should take a step back: my name is Kyle Broflovski, and I am dead. I know that much to be true, just as I know that I am an unknown presence in Craig's bedroom. He sees right through me, staring blankly at the wall as he silently gives himself the only pleasure that he can at this point. I debate whether he is modest or cold or both, since he strokes himself under his sheets as he thinks about Marla, the pale girl in his geometry class whom he is only half sure he will ever see again. He imagines fucking her and then holding her, and then they drift to sleep, but not before he finishes and then nods off here in his room, with me watching him silently. I do not know when Craig will die, but I can see it happen in my mind's eye, and I know that is how it will be.

* * *

><p>"<em>You goddamn idiot," Stan whispered to me as he choked back a sob<em>. For some reason, that is the only thing I can remember from my funeral, though I am beginning to think more may come later. I didn't remember that detail until just now, and I have been dead for at least a day, or maybe a year. Time is different here, and I haven't quite figured it out yet.

"Eleventytembreth," the voice instructs calmly over the intercom. I look at my card, but I can see no indication as to whether that is me. The symbol hastily scribbled on my card is gibberish, but I hold it close to me, hoping some kind of sign will guide me.

The air in the waiting room is heavy, a fog of molasses. As I drift off, I vaguely recall how Stan felt the last time I saw him. He was sad that I was leaving him alone, vulnerable. I hadn't wanted to stay, though. The alcohol had propelled me to my feet and carried me out the door of Token's parents' mansion and into the street, unaware, where it had happened, where I was ended.

"Eleventytembreth," the phantom voice repeats, slightly more irritated this time. The obese woman beside me startles awake, looks at her card solemnly, and rises, waddling to the hulking security guard. She hands him the card, which he stares at intently for several seconds as he mumbles. "Coriander… aquamarine… dandelion." He sniffs her card and then begins to chew it before spitting it out onto the ground and directing her to the red door to his left. She enters through it, and there is silence in the room once again.

I think back to Stan and how defeated he had seemed that night. I had tried to cheer him up, to let him know that there would be other fish in the sea, that Wendy leaving him didn't make him weak or pathetic or any less of a man. (God—for someone so attractive and beloved, my best friend was incredibly insecure about his masculinity.) But he hadn't been in the mood to hear it, so when I threatened to leave him there wallowing alone in his remorse, he begged me to stay, but for whatever reason I had wanted to go, and so I walked out the door of the large house on Canterbury Lane, forever sealing my fate.

"Octwelvular, octwelvular!" the voice on the intercom snaps icily. I feel a hand on my shoulder, jolting me back to the present.

"That's you, kid," the guard says with a gnarled, toothy grin. He had walked over to where I was sitting in the waiting room and escorted me to where the obese woman had stood only moments (hours?) before. He studies my card carefully, mumbling something incoherent before sniffing and swallowing it whole. He smiles and points to the red door. I am not sure that I want to go, but my feet carry me almost without me realizing it. What I see next is even more bizarre than what I'd encountered thus far.

* * *

><p>Nobody had taken the news harder than Ike. My brother, already a stoic lump of frustrated, pre-adolescent humanity, had been in no way prepared for my sudden, gruesome death at the hands of a drunk driver. Not that I am entirely without fault. After all, I had stumbled, inebriated, into the middle of the road, my reflexes not quick enough for me to extricate myself from the path of the speeding, erratic machine that would bring my physical death. But such trivialities do not matter to a child whose only sibling and most trusted friend has been snatched from him unfairly, quietly in the dead of night.<p>

Of course, my passing had emotionally paralyzed my father, who was, as a result, now oblivious to the fragile state of his adopted younger son. Only my mother, with whom my brother had a strained relationship, noticed his pain and tried to make it better. Well-intentioned as they were, though, her kind gestures—a special snack, a later curfew, a too-long kiss on the forehead—only frustrated him further. What Ike was missing from his life now was not unconditional love but a friend, a mentor, a partner in crime. I could see that he could not articulate what it was that he knew that he would miss but that he was well aware that he had lost something that he would have to work very hard to replace.

* * *

><p>"Well, suck my tits and call me a bitch, children," Chef said, laying down his cards and grinning. A chorus of groans filled the room.<p>

"Goddamnit, Chef! That's the fourth hand in a row. You're cheating," Satan fumed, standing and throwing his cards down on the table. "This isn't fair!" he exclaimed before stomping off to his den of solitude. The others shuffled away from the table casually, Genghis Khan and Marilyn Monroe off to meet Thomas Jefferson for cocktails, while Chef headed off to his date with Cleopatra, whom he had heard was a real sphinx between the sheets.

Only Kenny lingered, tucking a half-finished cigarette that Marilyn had been smoking into his jacket pocket. When he saw me, his eyes lit up, and he rushed over.

"Holy fucking shit, dude! When did you get here?!" he asked as he enveloped me in a giant hug.

I looked around worriedly, marveling at the hideous décor. "Is this…"

"Yep!" he smiled proudly. "Welcome to Hell!"

My stomach sank. "What? No! I can't be in Hell!"

My friend rolled his eyes and put his hand on my shoulder. "You've got a lot to learn, dude. It's not like you think."

"But I'm supposed to go to Heaven!"

He shrugged. "You can if you want. It's work-at-your-own-pace here." He retrieved a small device from his pocket and showed me a screen. It had a picture of him, under which a display read _27%_.

"What does that mean?" I asked.

"I'm 27% of the way to Heaven."

"But you've been dead for like five years! How long does it take to get to Heaven, dude?"

Kenny laughed. "I told you, it doesn't work that way here. I'll get there when I want to. I just haven't completed enough earthly service yet."

"Earthly service? What the hell does that mean?"

He fished a lighter from his pocket and relit Marilyn's stub. "Don't worry about that for now. Enjoy yourself while you're here. Have a drink. Get your Johnson worked on."

I stared at him in disbelief. "What the fuck, dude?! I have to get out of here."

"Suit yourself. I have to go, anyway. I have some ladies waiting on me back in my pod. I'll catch up with you next time you're around. And hey—don't worry, dude. All of the important stuff will be explained soon enough." With that he winked and vanished.

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><p>You never pay attention to the little things when you're alive. Now that I'm not, it's all I seem to notice—the singing of the wind in loose doorframes, the crisp color of the air, the way the snow crunches under my boots and my tracks vanish behind me as I drift through the night. I retrieve my karmambulator from my pocket and look at it again: 0%. This is going to be more difficult than I thought. Then again, I suppose that watching Craig jerk off in his bedroom doesn't exactly make me Mother Theresa.<p>

Does God watch people masturbate? Surely he must. Even if it wasn't intentional, it'd be bound to happen eventually. There are so many people in the world, and people masturbate so often, that if God is truly omniscient, he must see it all the time. By that logic, there must literally be someone somewhere jerking it 24/7. If you think about it, God essentially watches live-action porn all day long. Fucking sweet.

That's something I miss—not porn, specifically, but arousal. Those things are different now. I'm not entirely sure how, but I know that nothing down there works the same way that it used to. I haven't had the balls to look yet (do I even still have balls?), but I know that it's not like it used to be. That's a weird thing about death. Everything is just a little bit off, but it still makes sense. I can't recall much of my Afterlife Orientation now that I'm back on earth, but I can clearly remember Objective 1: Help One in Need.

But who the hell is _One_? I assumed it was Craig, since it was his room in which I appeared when I returned to earth, but that can't be right. All he did was jerk off and pass out. There's not much I could have done there, other than lend him a helping hand. Heh.

This is so fucking weird. I can clearly remember seeing the vision of Craig's death, and now the memory is practically gone, a wisp of its former self that I can barely recall. It is during this moment of fleeting memory that it hits me. My knees lock up, and my arms go numb. My mouth feels heavy, full of sand, and I can see it: the gibberish scribble that was on my card in Purgatory. It's as clear as anything in my mind's eye, shining in the storage room of Tweek Bros. Coffee. I know what to do. I have found my One.

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><p><em>Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed this first installment, and I welcome all feedback—complimentary and constructive—as I move on to the next. As you can see, I will be juggling multiple subplots here, and in fact, I have not even introduced all of them yet, so stay tuned for more to come in the next chapter.<em>

_Best wishes,_

_TEPR_


	2. Chapter 2

_Hi there! First, thanks to those of you who read and reviewed the first installment. I am excited to continue this story and hope you enjoy reading it as much as I enjoy writing it. This chapter's a bit more somber than the first, but hang in there—I'm going to try to fold in some more comedic stuff as I go._

_Happy readings!_

_TEPR_

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><p>"Fucking nice, dude!" I felt a hand on my back and turned, startled. It was Kenny. "I've never seen anyone finish their first objective so quickly. Satan might have to put you up on the wall!"<p>

After a moment, the shock of my friend's sudden appearance at my side began to wane, mixing with my newfound excitement at apparently having completed Objective 1.

"Let's see it," he said, fishing my karmambulator out of my jacket pocket. He took a drag on the cigarette he seemed to have magicked from nowhere as he read the display. He stared seriously for a moment and then broke into a grin. "There we go!"

He handed it back to me after the display updated from _0%_ to _3%_. To my surprise, my immediate response was fury.

"Seriously?! I was sent on that wild goose chase, and I'm only 3% of the way to Heaven? What the fuck?!"

My friend stared at me for a moment before beginning to cackle. "Oh my god, Kyle, you're too much." He continued to laugh before picking up on the fact that I was not amused. "Oh, you're serious?"

"Well… yeah! Do you have any idea how long of a night I've had?!"

"Of course, I do," he replied, now sipping from a flask. "I've been watching you since your Afterlife Orientation. By the way, I can't believe you didn't sneak a peek at Craig under the sheets earlier. I did, and I must say—I was not impressed."

"Gah!" I tackled him to the ground. "Kenny McCormick, tell me what the hell is going on, right now!" I realized what I had done and jumped back, extending my hand to help him up. I shook my head. "I'm sorry, dude. I don't what came over me. That was… weird."

Kenny took another drag and looked me in the eyes. "Death does strange things to a man, Kyle. But you're going to get used to it. In fact, that's why I'm here."

He grabbed my shoulders and continued. "The newly arrived in Hell are assigned a Watcher to keep track of them and guide them if they wander astray. Obviously, when I saw you, I immediately volunteered myself to be your Watcher. I know you're going to do great in the afterlife, buddy. There are some things you have to understand, though: we don't all move at the same pace. Now, I don't know why you only got 3% for saving Tweek's life, but I can tell you—"

"Wait, what?!" I jumped back, interrupting him. "What do you mean I saved Tweek's life?"

He grinned. "You did."

"But how do you know that? There's no way that guy would have killed him."

Kenny waved dismissively. "I saw it in my mind's eye. Here." He grabbed my hand, and closed my eyelids with his fingers. "Don't open them."

I heard him take a deep breath, and suddenly—we are there again. I see Tweek, just like he was when I walked into the warehouse and found him. He is crying, his shoulders trembling, his head buried in his knees as he sobs.

"Here we are," Kenny says. "If this were what happened, in 30 seconds you would walk through that door, and… well, you were there. You know how it ends. But it's not going to happen that way this time. Now we're going to see what would have happened if you hadn't arrived."

We continue to watch Tweek, shaking as he sits there on the ground of his father's stock room and makeshift office. Suddenly, I feel an electric chill roll down my spine, and I know that that is the moment I had entered \ the room previously. But this time that does not happen. Instead, I see Tweek take a deep breath and stand, retrieving the letter—Ah, yes! The letter!—and turning it over in his hand before looking at it and kissing it gently, slipping it back into his pocket after. He walks over to the desk in the corner, wipes a tear from his eye, and looks into the mirror on the wall one last time. He retrieves a key from his pocket and unlocks the top drawer of the desk, from which he retrieves a small pistol. He fumbles looking for the bullets, which I somehow know are in the second drawer on the right. He finally finds them and, with precision and grace, places the barrel into his mouth and ends himself.

Suddenly I am back outside, where Kenny had initially spooked me. I take a deep breath, jarred back to reality and the cold. Kenny is gone.

"Dude, are you still here?" I don't hear anything and take a couple of steps, looking around. "Come on, don't hide! I know you're still spying on me." I can detect no sign of my Watcher. I sigh, knowing that he is gone, or at least invisible to me once again.

I close my eyes and will myself into Tweek's bedroom. I appear there with him, and I know that I am an unknown presence to the other boy, who surfs the internet on his laptop leisurely. He is still a bit roughed up and probably sore, but I can tell that he feels better, confident that he has made the right decision. I don't stay long enough to watch him turn in, but I can see it in my mind, and I know that he will have the best night's sleep since the day he received the awful news.

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><p>Perhaps the most frustrating about death so far is that I seem to have no control over who can see me and who cannot. Granted, the only living person who has seen me so far has been Tweek, so maybe I am only seen by those who fit into my current objective. But then what's the deal with Craig? I still don't know why I appeared in his bedroom and why he couldn't see me, and I don't think Kenny is going to be of much help as I try to figure all of this out.<p>

On top of that, I am annoyed that I cannot make myself known to Ike, that I cannot reason with him, that I cannot scold him for making bad decisions. Seeing my little brother hanging out with the goth kids the other day was bad enough, but I couldn't bear to watch him try his first cigarette. He's eleven years old, for fuck's sake. He can't smoke! It's just not right. I want to help my brother. He needs me, and I can't be there for him. That's the worst part so far.

I want to get my last 97% helping Ike, but I know it's not going to work like that. I'm not sure why I know that, nor do I know how or if he will be helped out of his funk, but I know that I will not be his savior. I hate it, but that's how it will be. I can't put my finger on who's next, but I can feel that my next objective will come soon.

As I float through the empty streets in the midnight hour, I can't help but think of Tweek. I want to hold onto the memory. I don't want to lose it like I did the vision of Craig's death. I close my eyes and focus intently. I take myself back to the moment.

I had been compelled to bust down the door of the storage room of Tweek Bros. Coffee, but I found I did not have to, as the door opened for me without a problem, despite the fact that it was locked from the inside. Naturally, Tweek was confused and frightened upon seeing his dead classmate appear to him in the room, looking no different than I had the last time he had seen me, more than a week prior, at Token's house party—alive and wasted.

"What the fuck, man?! Is this some kind of joke?" the blonde had stammered, backing away in terror.

I remembered closing my eyes and filling the room with a calming spirit that I hadn't previously realized I possessed. As I did, Tweek had immediately calmed down, suddenly understanding, inexplicably, how it was that I was there with him in that moment.

"You have to be strong right now." Those clichéd words left my mouth without my even considering them. I could explain them no more easily than I could the great hug in which I had then wrapped Tweek up, shielding him from the darkness that was descending.

It was in the next moment that the meth head had busted through the locked door through which I had so effortlessly passed.

"Where the fuck's my fix, asshole?" he had growled, clearly fucked up. Though I wanted to intervene, I could not. I could only watch as he gave Tweek two hard blows to the stomach and scratched the boy's face with a gnarled fingernail before spitting on him and leaving.

Upon brushing himself off after the scuffle, Tweek had explained to me the long version of the story, which included the fact that his best friend Craig, who possessed the preternatural business savvy that Tweek so obviously lacked, had helped him to partner with the Underpants Gnomes to manufacture meth, which they had sold to local hobos and degenerates. When Craig's cancer bubbled to the surface, Tweek's anxiety had overwhelmed him to the point that he was too stressed to continue working with the Gnomes—who admittedly frightened him more than they should have—or manufacturing the drug that was in great demand in South Park. In turn, most of his and Craig's former customers had turned elsewhere for their fixes, but this one had continued to linger. I wasn't sure how I knew it, but as I saw the meth head flee the stock room that night, I knew that he wouldn't be back to bother Tweek.

When the man was gone, I had looked into Tweek's eyes and silently assured him that things would be better now. After a moment, he had walked away without saying anything. He had pulled a letter from his pocket, gently kissed it, and walked out of the warehouse, locking the door behind him. He had left me there alone, after which I slowly found myself disappearing from the room and reappearing on the street outside, alone. It had been in the next moment that Kenny had appeared, scaring the shit out of me.

I have to know what the hell is in that letter, I decide, though I know now it will never be used for its intended purpose. I will myself back into Tweek's bedroom one more time. He is asleep now, and I retrieve the envelope from the front pocket of his discarded jeans, tucked away and neatly folded. I pull out the letter and read it.

_Craig,_

_I am sorry it has to be this way, but everything is too much now. I have wanted to tell you this for some time, but I've been afraid, and now I've missed my chance: I love you, in a romantic way. I realize that it's too late now and that I've waited too long to tell you this, but you're the only thing that is important to me, and it looks like you will be gone soon yourself. I'm sorry again._

I wipe a tear from my eye as I reread it. The weight of everything hits me, and it is too much. I need to rest.

* * *

><p>Today I feel refreshed. Rest for the dead, I have found, is not much different than it is for the living. We don't sleep, of course; we recharge. I would explain it to you, but you wouldn't really understand. I'm beginning to get the hang of it, though. The first time I recharged, I saw the faces of Kenny, Tweek, and Craig. When I recharged this time, it was three new faces. One of them was hurting, one of them was helping, and the other was my mother.<p>

When I am recharged, I decide to visit my mother since I do not yet know my second objective. She is alone at home and, as I predicted, she cannot see me. I know she feels the brokenness surrounding her, pulling her down. My father, paralytic, remains useless, while Ike slips further away. She imagines me in the sweet hereafter, but her hopes are not enough to quiet the storms she struggles to keep at bay. And when I look at her I can see something else. An aura surrounds her; it is vivid, yet I cannot describe what it is that I see. It means something, and I think it is bad. If nothing else, I can feel it is ominous, and something tells me that once I figure out what it means, it will prove revelatory.

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><p>It is later, as I shuffle aimlessly through the streets, that I feel the vibration of my karmambulator. <em>Objective 2<em>: _Give Love_, it reads. I think back to the other two people I saw when I recharged this time. As I close my eyes to process everything, I see Kenny. He tells me, "Follow your gut on this one."

I shiver at my gut instinct here, as the thought of one of the other two people from my recharge period comes clearly into focus—the one who was hurting, my best friend in the world. I convulse and feel heavy, just like before, and I know I must go to Stan.

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><p><em>Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed this second installment, and I welcome all feedback—complimentary and constructive—in a review. What were your thoughts on this chapter? Did it need more of the comedic touches that I put in chapter one, or did it hit the right notes for you?<em>

_I am aiming to update this story about once a week, so be on the lookout for the next chapter!_

_Cheers,_

_TEPR_


	3. Chapter 3

_Hi there! _

_I'm not normally one to put disclaimers in my stories (that's what the rating is for), but this chapter includes more salty language than the previous two, as well as a sex scene of sorts… so consider yourself warned. That being said, happy readings!_

_TEPR_

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><p>Butters Stotch. There's a name I have not heard in a while, a person I've not even thought about in the time since I've been dead—however long that is. Of the three people I saw during my second recharge, he was the murkiest. I don't know who he was helping, but I saw him, clear as anything.<p>

As I make my way through the snow to Stan, I try to piece it all together. Maybe Butters will help my mother. Whatever that aura around her was, I think it was bad, and maybe he can fix the thing that is ailing her. Or maybe he is going to cure Craig's cancer. That would explain why my appearance in Craig's bedroom remains a mystery to me. Or maybe it's all more complicated than that.

One thing I have learned since dying is that there are things that humans can't know. The supernatural exists, but not in ways that the living can easily comprehend. I am one such example, though the dead like me are hardly the most bizarre creatures roaming the earth.

As I shuffle along the sidewalk, my tracks disappearing just as quickly behind me, I close my eyes and think of everything I have learned about Stan by eavesdropping since my death: he is failing trig, he doesn't want to play football anymore, Wendy needs her space. It is this last thing that resonates, and I wonder for a moment how deep the implications of my second objective, _Give Love_, really are.

I decide it is a good time to conjure. This is another thing I have discovered about life after death: not only can I will myself into specific moments, but I can also conjure events that have happened outside of the purview of my own experience, living or dead. Just recently, for example, I looked on from a cozy spot on the grassy knoll while Jackie Kennedy held her husband in a Dallas motorcade. Tonight I transport myself to a no less ominous scene, one fraught with frustration and the dour acknowledgement of a probable ending.

They bicker. Wendy tells Stan she doesn't like the fact that he has tried alcohol, that he is too young to abuse his body in such a way. He calls her a cunt and regrets it immediately. She shakes her head and tells him to fuck off. He slams a door. This is the first time they have despised each other this much.

* * *

><p>Shapeshifting is another perk of being dead, one I have yet to explore before now. I remember being mesmerized by the idea during Afterlife Orientation, watching intently as Adolf Hitler became Marlon Brando, a pony, Barbra Streisand.<p>

"Only shapeshift responsibly," Satan had implored. "Shapeshifting can be dangerous when you do it in the realm of the living. You must remember how precarious human existence really is…"

Admittedly, I had zoned out a bit during the lecture. At his most academic, Satan is an unbearable bore. They call it Hell for a reason.

After that session of orientation ended, I had wandered the fiery depths wondering what I might like to shapeshift into. There were so many things I couldn't experience when I was alive, and now that I wasn't, it seemed the possibilities were endless. I could be whoever I wanted to be, do whatever I wanted to do, fuck whoever I wanted to fuck. It was during my extended pondering of that last thought that I had encountered Kenny sharing a spliff with Marilyn. He was showing her how he could make her skirt blow upward, just like in _The Seven Year Itch_. She was more amused than annoyed but let him know in no uncertain terms that he would have to look elsewhere to get his rocks off tonight. After Marilyn sauntered off, Kenny had accepted my company as a consolation prize.

"You like what I did there?" he had asked, grinning as he took another drag. "It's amazing the things you can do when you're dead."

"Can you do shit like that when you're on earth?" I had asked, intrigued. I was so excited about my first trip back to the surface and what all might be possible.

"Yes and no," he had said, shaking his head. "I mean, you can, but you shouldn't." He paused and added, "Most of them won't be able to see you, anyway."

"What do you mean?"

"You'll see when you're on your first objective. Some people can see you, and some can't. Don't ask me. I don't make the rules."

* * *

><p>I realize as I arrive at Stan's front door that the entire Marilyn episode and Satan's shapeshifting lecture had completely disappeared from my memory until now. I wonder as I prepare to enter the Marsh residence if maybe this is what Kenny had meant when told me to "follow my gut on this one". Is my newfound knowledge of shapeshifting what I need to help my friend?<p>

I drift into the Marsh house invisibly. I silently shuffle past Randy and Sharon cuddled on the couch and, when I reach the landing, choose to ignore the quiet, raging angst seeping from under Shelly's door. My destination, which I have known many times, is clear: the last room on the right.

He does not see me when I enter, and I think that is a good thing. He is quietly doing crunches on his bedroom floor, the silence only interrupted by the occasional grunt or murmured expletive. I am aware of how warm it is in the room, and after a few minutes, I am not the only one. Stan peels off his shirt and continues with his routine, eventually switching to push-ups and then lunges.

"Fucking bitch," he murmurs, fire in his eyes.

Time is not something I've mastered since my return to the surface, but if I had to guess, the breakup happened only days ago. I have seen so much and also so little since I've come back that I don't fully understand what the passing of time means anymore, for me or for anyone else.

Besides time, the other thing that has remained elusive in the afterlife is sex. What I feel toward Stan right now is not attraction as I remember it, but it is close, similar yet also so very different. Seeing him working out without his shirt does something to me. I feel faint, paper thin, but I have the power of a thousand wild stallions charging into battle, and try as I might, I don't want to not acknowledge that. It feels right in my gut.

I bend time to a halt on a feverish whim. I close my eyes, focus intently, and imagine myself as Wendy Testaburger. When I open them again, it is so. I am startled when I feel myself. Though I have never seen Wendy naked, I know everything is right, from her slightly pointed earlobes to her strong, taut calves. Her small soles support me, and her energy propels me. I bring Stan back into the present of a moment that has never existed, realizing when joins me that I have pulled it off without a hitch. I am here with him in his room, just like before, only now he sees me—sees _her_. I am Wendy, I tell myself, and I am here to give love.

"I guess you're here to apologize," he says, finishing the lunge he started before I arrived. Compelled by a sense of modesty, he slips back on his shirt while I contemplate how I want to proceed. I see in his eyes that his arrogance here is a facade and that he is more fractured than I ever could have known.

As I prepare to speak, I realize how different I feel. The way words form in my mouth is new, as is the shape of my lips as I exhale. The heaviness on my chest is a new sensation, as well—one that I don't think I like very much. I chalk it up to the fact that this is my first time inhabiting a female body.

"You're right, I'm sorry," I say, playing my part. I can tell I have caught him off guard and feel compelled to continue on. "I shouldn't have said what I did. I didn't mean it, you know. I still love you."

I melt him like butter. It is a bizarre sensation seeing your best friend like this, his macho veneer worn away to nothing, a shell of his normal self now under your potent spell.

My control of the moment proves false, as I unexpectedly fall prey to my friend's desires. I moan as his rough hand massages my breast, and I am suddenly aware of my powerlessness. He kisses me hard, and my tongue meets his, jab for impassioned jab. In no time he rolls me onto the bed, and each of us disrobes frantically. I take the moment to witness both of us naked, and it is breathtaking. I died a virgin, and the sight of him, of me, of us, is almost more than I can handle. He slowly slips two fingers in my mouth, and I suck them delicately. He grins cockily and moves his hand to touch me _down there_. Suddenly I hear a noise like a horn on a ship. There is a bright white flash, and I am outside on the street.

* * *

><p>"What in the everloving fuck are you doing?!" It is Kenny. Kenny is pissed. As he yells, I am aware that I am now back to my old self, a dead Kyle instead of a live Wendy.<p>

"You can't fuck the living, dipshit! That is majorly against the rules. Do you have any idea what you could have done?"

I give it a second to make sure it's not a rhetorical question. I then realize that I have no idea what to say because I don't know what I've done.

"This is so fucked. _You_ are so fucked. You're lucky I'm good at playing damage control, or Satan would have already skewered both of us."

"I'm sorry, dude. I didn't know. What's the big deal?"

Kenny lights a cigarette. "The last time something like this happened, there was a ripple. Killed four fucking people. Conspiracy theorists crawling out of the woodwork, government cover-ups, all that horseshit. And you wanna know why? Some dead dumbshit like you decided he wanted to get his rocks off with his ex, so he impersonated her new husband. They start fucking. Then halfway through their little romp, the real husband shows up. The presence of both of them in the same room caused a ripple—think an overload of the space-time continuum, a small bomb. Killed both of them, plus their baby in the next room, and an elderly neighbor who had a heart attack because she thought it was gunshots outside her door. You impersonate someone living, you're playing with fucking fire. I didn't stop you at first because I thought—hey, Kyle's smart, he's responsible, he can handle this. Fucking nope. You take off your clothes, you lose all your goddamn sense."

I suddenly feel the urge to defend myself. "But I was just trying to complete my second objective!"

He sighs. "I know. But you gotta be careful. First off, you _cannot_ have sex with a living person. Ever. I meant what I said: it makes you lose your mind."

"Yeah, it was… weird. I felt like I completely lost the upper hand. How does that work, exactly?"

"Sex has some kind of power over the dead that's even stronger than when you're alive. The weird thing is that most dead people don't even feel sexual attraction. Truth is, you probably wouldn't have either if you hadn't put yourself in that predicament."

I suddenly realize the practical implications of what has happened, and I panic. "So how badly did I fuck this up? Is that what that flash was—a ripple? Holy fuck, is Stan dead?!"

For the first time since I saw him tonight, Kenny grins slyly. "No. That was my handiwork. Consider it a divine intervention, if you will."

"I don't follow."

"I used my powers to erase the moment completely. It never happened. Stan is still in his room cursing Wendy and doing push-ups. He's not going to get laid tonight or tomorrow or the next day. In three weeks, he'll fuck one of the cheerleaders, Wendy will get jealous, they'll make up, and tra la la, everything is good again."

I look at him stunned. "How do you know that? And why could you magically undo what I did?"

"One of the perks of being your Watcher: I'm also your editor if you fuck something up. As for being able to see into the future, you have that gift, too. You'll get better at it the longer you're dead and the more earthly service you do. I mean, I know for a fact you've seen how it all ends for Craig."

Suddenly the vision returns to me. "Yeah," I whisper. "I have."

Kenny stomps out what remains of his cigarette on the ground. "So here's what happens now. There's good news, bad news, and really fucking shitty news. The good news is that I've convinced Satan not to banish your stupid ass to eternal damnation. The bad news is you're back on fuckin' training wheels, and I get to push you around on them. That means that for the indefinite future—until I am of the sound opinion that you are no longer a danger to the living—I have to say with you 24/7 to make sure you don't fuck everything all to hell. Yippee for me, right? On the bright side, because I intervened and because you were trying to do the right thing, you didn't technically fail your second objective. But you also didn't succeed, so no points on the karmambulator for you this time."

He gives me a moment to process the weight of everything he has said. After a moment I ask, "So what's next?"

He bites his lip nervously, the first crack I have witnessed in my Watcher's otherwise poised demeanor. "You've been reassigned to a new second objective. That's the shitty news."

I take a breath, fearing the worst. "What's the objective?"

Kenny's stare pierces right through me, and I can tell it is because he doesn't want to say this next part.

"You have to kill somebody."

* * *

><p><em>Thanks for reading! <em>

_I hope you enjoyed this chapter. This story continues to surprise me as I write each new installment. I feel like it keeps pulling me in bizarre new directions, which I appreciate, though it's certainly uncharted territory for me. Anyway, let me know your thoughts!_

_Cheers,_

_TEPR_


	4. Chapter 4

_Hi there! _

_Just a heads-up: this chapter is a bit longer than the others, but I promise it's a quick enough read. I just decided to cover more ground this time around._

_Happy readings!_

_TEPR_

* * *

><p>The majority of living people, especially young ones, rarely think about death, he tells me. These people generally are happy, though they are often not as perceptive as the rest of the living, who, by comparison, practically obsess about their own mortality. Whether they suffer from hypochondria or paranoia or just fear the imminent demise that awaits them all, their fascination with what lies beyond their natural life is worth noting. At least that is how Kenny explains his take on the living's perception of death.<p>

The verdict is out on whether Kenny's words of wisdom are indeed inspired or if he's just spouting whatever bullshit comes to mind. It's funny: I remember when he was alive, Kenny was never particularly chatty. It seems like ever since he's been stuck with me after my fuck-up, though, he's not shut up once. I'm not sure if it's to spite me or because he's not used to having company in the afterlife 24/7, but either way, it's taken some getting used to. Since I died, I'd largely had nothing but my own thoughts to entertain me and keep me sane. I began to cherish the silence and even came to embrace it as a way of life-after-death. Now I realize I took my solitude for granted.

I guess I can't complain too much. Even though I've had to grow accustomed to his nonstop chatter, Kenny _did_ spare me from eternal damnation—at least that's his hard-boiled version of the story. Plus, if half of the crap he spews is true, then I've learned quite a bit in the weeks since I semi-failed my first Objective 2.

Did you catch that? That's right: I said _weeks_. Kenny has shown me how time works, and I mostly have a handle on it. I wish I could properly explain it to you, but you wouldn't really get it. I mean, I know that you understand the concept of a week, but time moves at a different pace in the afterlife than it does for the living. So even though I used the word _weeks_, I mean that's how long it would have been if I were still alive. For us, though, time passes more slowly, in ways that you can't even comprehend. You'll understand when you die.

Anyway, back to the point at hand: as revelatory as Kenny's musings on time are, I am more interested in his thoughts on death, whether they are entirely credible or not. The thing is that when you're alive, regardless of how much you think about death, you mostly think of it in terms of your own death. I know was when I was alive, I never paid much thought to other people's mortality. During the last few weeks, though, it's practically all that's been on my mind.

My mark, the person I have been assigned to kill, is none other than Jeffrey M. Dowager, the meth head who attacked Tweek in the warehouse the night I completed Objective 1. Fortunately, I have been told, killing people in the afterlife is relatively painless and not too gruesome an experience. However, Kenny tells me, it is a task I must complete alone.

"I'll still be watching over you," he explains.

"I really appreciate that," I say, breathing a sigh of relief.

"Yeah, well, it's not by choice. I'm just trying to cover my own ass here, and watching you like a hawk is part of the deal I made with Satan, so don't get the wrong idea."

Now that I've gotten used to it, Kenny's veneer of detached callousness amuses me. He talks big, but I know that he really does want me to succeed here. This is just his odd way of showing it.

"I'll just be out here," he continues, lighting up. "I can't go inside with you. Them's the rules, kid."

Now that the moment has arrived, I am suddenly aware how much I don't want to do this alone.

"What if I fuck this one up?" I ask.

"Honestly… I don't think you will," he says, clasping my shoulder with a firm hand. "But if you do, I'll be there in a jiffy."

I nod, take a deep breath, and decide after a moment of silence that now's as good a time as any to do the deed. I enter the rundown house invisibly, spilling through the gaping cracks in the doorframe like wispy air on a crisp January midnight. The place is an eyesore and, if it were a public facility, would no doubt be in violation of dozens of health code guidelines. I recognize the smell, and if I were alive, I'd have the urge to vomit. It's the stench of shit, bubbling out from a narrow room in the hallway without a door. I peer in and see the problem: there is no handle on the commode, so waste has been piling up. Christ.

I turn a corner, and there he is sprawled out on a soiled mattress in the corner of the room, a moldy pizza box and long-empty Fireball bottle near his feet. Even more peculiar, he is faintly glowing, and it is something that is immediately familiar to me. I take a moment to be thankful that there are no other inhabitants in this place that the man calls home. Mr. Dowager, known largely as "Buzz" to his motley assortment of friends and far-flung acquaintances, is clearly passed out, for which I am also thankful. I have not been properly trained in the art of murder, but Kenny told me that when the moment presented itself, I would know what to do. Cheers to that.

I stand over him, and I feel it in the sinew of my bones. Kenny was right: I know what I have to do. I close my eyes and lay my hands over him, hovering silently. I force all of the energy I can downward, and I see it hit him like a great weight. His eyes flash open, and he stares up at me, mortified. This alarms me, but I do not lose my stride. I take myself back to the moment, to what he did to Tweek, and I am suddenly re-energized and more attuned to my purpose here. He stares up at me, frightened but immobile, the imaginary weight locking him to the grimy mattress. I twist and curl and hurl my fingers downward, and I see his spirit break like an autumn twig. It is quick; he barely writhes and only softly moans before he is gone.

The next moment is the most surreal I have experienced in the afterlife thus far. The realization that I have ended another life is astounding. It is shameful but also so exhilarating. When I am sure that the deed is done, I drift back out of the ramshackle abode and see Kenny by the mailbox, grinning big and puffing on an oversized cigar.

"Fucking nice," he says, offering me a drag.

I decline, feeling unsettled but also accomplished. He reaches for my karmambulator, but I beat him to it: _11%_.

"Not bad," he says, snaking his arm around my shoulder. "You know," he adds after a moment, "you're kind of a natural. That was some Grade A killing."

At this point, I am not sure if he is genuinely congratulating or teasing me—perhaps both—but I blush responsively. "Thanks, but I'm sure you're much better."

"Wouldn't know," he says, extinguishing his cigar on a lamppost.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean I'm not a killer."

"Well, I'm not, either!" I snap, pulling away from him. "Shit."

"Hey, _killer_ is not a four-letter word. You killed out of necessity. That's nothing to be ashamed of. I'm simply stating that I have never been assigned murder as an objective. Just chill, Broflovski. It's not a big deal."

"It is to me! I feel fucking terrible. Do you have any idea what it's like to strip someone else of their life? Well, I fucking do, and it sucks."

He stares at me a moment, choosing his words carefully. He pauses and then drops the topic completely. "I have an idea," he says. "Why don't we get your mind off this for a while? Since you don't have your next objective yet, we can do anything you want. Wanna go to Vegas? Catch a movie? Spy on some chicks changing in a locker room?"

I roll my eyes at his suggestions. I would really just like to be alone right now, but I know that's not possible.

"Actually, there is something I'm curious about," I say after a moment of deliberation. I tell him, and he smiles, and we go.

* * *

><p>It's funny: after death, your body turns into something of a GPS. We begin to walk toward Tweek, but I can sense that he's not home. It is not until we are nearly halfway to our destination that I realize we are actually walking to Craig's house. I know that the worst—you know, <em>the worst<em>—hasn't happened yet, but I still can't help but feel a sense of dread as we approach the two-story brown house.

Kenny and I stealthily ascend to Craig's bedroom, and I feel a sense of déjà vu, back in the first place I arrived upon my initial return to earth. This time, the landscape is not nearly as desperate or devoid of life. Instead, the lights are on, and there is music and laughter. Despite that he is visibly weaker than his counterpart, Craig is having a good time, and I can't help but smile at that. I study their body language carefully, and it is obvious that Tweek has not made the big reveal to his best friend yet. I wonder if it is because he is afraid of rejection or because he doesn't want to freak out his terminally ill friend or because he just hasn't found the right moment yet. Whatever it is, I am most puzzled by the fact that I can't get a good read on the situation, as I have discovered that in the afterlife, I am generally quite adept at reading the living.

Kenny props up his elbow on my shoulder. "Seen enough? I'm getting kinda bored, dude."

I realize I'm not sure how long we've been here spying on Craig and Tweek, but I decide I'm content to leave this pleasant scene as is. Besides, there's one more place I want to visit while Kenny and I are playing espionage tonight.

* * *

><p>"I do not support this idea," Kenny announces with mock panic, as he follows me in the snow. "I mean, are you sure you're going to be able to resist the urge to jump his bones?" At that, he bursts out laughing. He continues, "Whatever will you do if he cups your soft, supple breast again?"<p>

"Oh, fuck off. I just want to make sure Stan's holding up alright. That's all. I feel really responsible after what happened the last time."

"Yeah, well, like I said—I corrected that mistake. It never happened."

The rest of the walk to the Marsh house is largely silent, unusual for a trip with Kenny, to be sure. As we arrive on the lawn, he puts his hand on my shoulder.

"Dude, there's something I should tell you before we go in," he says. He bites his lip and continues, unusually nervous. "He's not in a good place right now."

I smack his hand away. "What the hell do you mean?! You said everything would be fine, that he was going to hook back up with Wendy."

"He did, dude, but that was weeks ago. He slept with the cheerleader, then they hooked back up, but it didn't last."

I am immediately furious, and it's weird: since dying, I have not found myself all that attached to the living—other than my immediately family and Stan—but when the mood does strike, I feel an almost preternatural urge to protect them at any cost.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?! Why would you mislead me like that? Do you have any idea how much Stan means to me?" I shove him hard before I realize that I've done it.

Kenny takes it in stride and sighs, curling his tongue under his upper lip. "It doesn't matter," he snaps back.

"What do you mean, it doesn't matter?"

"Look, asshole, I mean that how you feel doesn't matter anymore. You are fucking dead, and you're never coming back. You don't have feelings to protect. You are a non-entity, a memory."

"God, you can be a dick sometimes."

"Well, it's the truth. Look, I'm sorry, but I didn't tell you about Stan because I didn't think you could handle it at the time. You were so shaken up about what you did that night that I didn't think it would be a good idea to show you what was coming. Anyway, I'll show you now, but I don't think you're going to like it."

We slip inside unnoticed and drift up to Stan's room. He is passed out on his bed, door locked, faint rock music drifting through the speakers on his laptop.

"Look under here," Kenny says, lifting up the comforter that covers the gap under his bed. He reaches his arm under and pulls out can after can.

"So what?" I ask. "He's just drinking. I mean, that's not the end of the world."

Kenny shakes his head before putting his palm to my forehead, and I see what he sees. Stan has been drinking a lot, every night. I see him crying after he drinks, and he is inconsolable. After he gets back together with Wendy, he is cold, distant. She pleads with him to stop drinking. She does not leave his side. Eventually, he tells her that he doesn't think he can continue to love her, that he appreciates her as his friend but that what they have is over. He breaks her heart this time, and they go their separate ways for now. She tells his mother that he has been drinking, and Sharon feels deep sadness upon realizing that her son is probably on the same path to on-again, off-again alcoholism that has marked the majority of his father's adulthood. Sharon does her best, but it all feels gestural to her. She knows that her Stanley will continue to drink and that there is not much she can do to stop him.

"Shit," I whisper. I lean on Kenny for support as I stare at my friend on his bed. After a moment, I ask my Watcher, "How can he be so fucked up about Wendy and then leave her? I don't understand."

"Oh, Kyle," he says. "It's not her, it's you."

Kenny shows me more. He shows me that when Stan drinks, it's always me he's thinking about. He never in a million years thought he would lose his best friend so early. Who would be his roommate freshman year of college now? Who would be the best man at his wedding? So many plans quashed in a single moment. I was the brother he never had, and my loss apparently shattered him in ways that he never could have anticipated. The sorrow came on late, replacing the frustration and anger I had seen in his eyes at my funeral. And with the beginnings of grief came the drinking.

"We have to help him," I plead with Kenny. "We have to do something."

He grips me firmly. "There's nothing we can do. You know that. We can't intervene here."

I want to cry. "How does it end? What happens to Stan?"

"Ultimately, he dies," Kenny says gravely. "They all do."

I pull away from him. "I know, but when? And how? What happens?"

He shakes his head. "I honestly don't know. And I promise I'm telling the truth this time."

* * *

><p>Before we retire for the night, Kenny decides he wants to show me one more thing. Were I not in such a somber mood from seeing Stan in such a state, I would joke that I feel like Ebenezer Scrooge getting paraded around by all the Christmas ghosts.<p>

"Bad things happen in the world, Kyle, but so do good things. We have to remember that. We have a unique vantage point because we get to see pretty much all of it go down from where we are. The irony is that the living don't have the luxury of that same perspective. But that doesn't mean that sometimes they can't find grace and show one another the compassion that they themselves so desperately crave."

This is one of those moments when I am glad that Kenny likes to ramble. I absorb him like a well-used sponge. "Let's take a visit to the Broflovski house," he says, and we do.

"Who are we here to see?" I ask. As I look around the house, I soak up the remnants of the former life that is no longer mine to live. I follow Kenny into the kitchen, where Ike is seated at the table, a book in front of him, faintly smiling as he talks to Butters, who sits across from him, explaining something with a diagram.

"Your mother enrolled him in a mentorship program," Kenny says, answering the question I was preparing to ask. "She realized that she and your father could no longer provide the help that he needed and that what he required was a Kyle surrogate."

A part of me feels a deep sadness at the reminder that Ike no longer has a brother, but another part of me is glad that he is getting the kind of attention he needs from someone who can stand in.

"I have to admit, Butters wouldn't have been my first choice to replace me," I joke.

Kenny smiles. "That's fair. But it could have been much worse." That is true. The influence of the goth kids seems to have largely diminished, and he is not smoking, so there are obvious improvements.

"How long has this arrangement been going on?" I ask.

"In living time," Kenny says, "a bit less than a month."

I nod, content. We watch them until they are done, largely silent spectators in the enormous kitchen that surrounds the two boys at the table. I won't lie: there is something immensely and intangibly satisfying about watching my little brother do his homework and do it right. When I was alive, I never could be bothered with such banalities. Now, they are practically awe-inspiring.

When Butters rises to go, he gives Ike a firm side hug, which mildly embarrasses my brother, though no one is around to see (that he knows of!) and I know he is, in fact, appreciative of the attention. After Ike retires to his room to play video games before bed, Kenny and I find my parents in their bedroom. My mother pleads with my father, whose sadness largely still paralyzes him, to attend grief counseling. For whatever reason, he continues to shoot down the recommendation, and I see that my mother is growing tired of his refusal to help himself get better. I ponder the thought for a moment, hoping that my death does not eventually become a wedge that fractures my parents' marriage to a point of disrepair. I consider asking Kenny if he has any insight into this matter but decide it probably best I not know—at least for now.

As I prepare to tell my Watcher that I am ready to leave, something catches my eye. It is the aura that I have seen surrounding my mother in weeks past. With a hitherto absent sense of clarity, I make a connection.

"That glow," I say to Kenny, "I've seen it before. It was the same one that surrounded Buzz when I went to kill him. What is it?"

Kenny closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, snapping his fingers and transporting us outside of my family's house. "I've been meaning to talk to you about that," he says, lighting a cigarette. "There's no easy way to say this, so I'll be blunt: your mother is a mark. Someone has been assigned to kill her."

* * *

><p><em>Thanks for reading! <em>

_For those of you wondering, I have finished outlining this story, and I now I have plan for how (and when) it will end. I think you will enjoy the conclusion(s), so stay tuned for updates! Also, if you are so inclined, please leave a review. Writers love reviews, and I am no different._

_Cheers,_

_TEPR_


	5. Chapter 5

_Hi there! _

_This is another longish chapter, but it's the last one before the epilogue, so I had a lot of ground to cover._

_Also, I took a note from the Raymond Carver stylebook for the end of this chapter, which I think (hope) fellow Carver fans will appreciate. (Specifically, there are whispers of "A Small, Good Thing" and "Cathedral" lurking in there.)_

_Happy readings!_

_TEPR_

* * *

><p>After Kenny told me the news about my mother, I wanted to talk about it. I wanted to yell at him. I wanted to shake him for hiding it from me. Instead, I was overcome with exhaustion and followed my Watcher's advice to recharge. At least, that's how I remember it. When I awaken, I am in Hell. I cannot move.<p>

"Hello?" I muster, trying to dart my eyes around.

Kenny suddenly appears at my side, and I am mobile once again. I fall to the ground and scramble to stand, mildly embarrassed at my inexplicable lapse in dexterity. Kenny's eyes remain locked on me, expressionless, as I regain my physical composure. When I meet his gaze, I know there is a reason I was upset, but I cannot remember what it is.

"Sorry we had to restrain you," he says coolly. "After we left your parents' house, you were freaking out, so I suggested you recharge." It all starts coming back to me.

"My mother!" I say, panicked. "There's no time to—" He raises his hand to stop me. My lips keep moving, but no sound comes out. Shit. How does Kenny know all these afterlife tricks? I have a lot to learn.

He continues, "You didn't want to recharge. You were really stressed and angry, and eventually you just passed out. We don't see a whole lot of that around here."

"But it does happen from time to time," I hear a familiar voice say, continuing Kenny's thought as he approaches from around a corner. Then there he is: Satan. This is my first time seeing him since Afterlife Orientation. Trailing behind him, as always, is his personal assistant, a prissy boy named Gaston who is clad only in skimpy briefs and a shiny sash that reads _No. 2_. Gaston carries a clipboard, seemingly jotting down everything the Prince of Darkness says.

"It is rare for someone in the afterlife to pass out," Satan says, studying me carefully. "Let me get some readings." He extends his hand backwards toward Gaston. The boy doesn't miss a beat, retrieving a thin metal cylinder from his briefs and handing it to his boss. Satan presses a button on the end, which causes a digital display to appear on the side of the device. He grabs my head and tilts it back slightly, shoving a third of the cylinder up my right nostril.

I am confused as to what is happening but am too nervous to say anything in the presence of Satan, who, according to Kenny, threatened to banish me to eternal damnation after my little slip-up with Stan. At this point I'm not even sure that I could talk if I wanted to. I breathe through my mouth, trying not to think about the device currently probing my sinuses or where Gaston stores it. (Fucking gross.) After a moment, Satan pulls it out, and sticks his hand behind him, cuing Gaston to retrieve his boss' reading glasses from his briefs and hand them over to him. Satan studies the display on the device, leaning down to whisper notes to Gaston, who quickly records everything he says. The entire time, Kenny looks on in silence, intrigued and obviously in the loop about whatever is happening right now.

After a moment of deliberation, Satan walks over and whispers something to Kenny, who nods knowingly. The Prince of Darkness then approaches me and shakes my hand, cracking a smile for the first time since he appeared in the room. "This is good. This is very good," he says to me cryptically before turning and departing.

Gaston walks over, places his hands together, and bows gently toward me. "Namaste," he says before shuffling after his boss.

I stare at Kenny for a moment after the other two are gone. "What the hell was that?!" I say, a bit disoriented but glad that my voice has returned.

"Nothing for you to be concerned about," my Watcher says dismissively, placing his hand on my shoulder. He looks me in the eyes and continues, "What's important now is that I know your third objective. If you do it correctly, you'll save your mother's life."

* * *

><p>We are back on the surface. Before he tells me who I am to kill next, Kenny says, he wants to show me something to lift my spirits.<p>

"Fucking seriously, dude?" I ask. "Just tell me who it is so that I can get it over with."

"No," he says sternly. "Not yet."

"I don't need my spirits lifted. I feel fine. Besides, the sooner this is done with, the sooner I can save my mom."

"You don't have to worry about her… for now."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" I ask, suddenly annoyed. "Do you know something that I don't? You've been acting really fucking weird ever since I killed that bum. I swear, if there's some secret that you're keeping from me, I'll…" I trail off, realizing the futility of threatening Kenny.

"What? You'll kill me?" he smirks. "Too fucking late." He lights a cigarette.

"I just want the truth," I say, more annoyed than before and quickly losing my patience.

"Okay, here's the deal," he says. "Satan promised me that nothing is going to happen to your mother before you finish your third objective. That's why I didn't tell you about her being a mark earlier. No harm, no foul."

"So, what? If she's not going to die, then why should I complete my next objective? I don't want to kill anyone else, Ken."

"That's not how it works, bud. The deal is that your mom is safe until you complete the objective. Then, once you do, she won't be a mark anymore."

"And what if I refuse?"

"If you decide not to do the deed, Satan will lift his veil of protection from her, and all bets are off. Your call, Broflovski." With that, he flicks away the end of his cigarette and starts strolling away.

My heart skips a beat, and I am suddenly terrified, aware for the first time since Kenny started travelling with me that my Watcher may not be on my side, that his loyalties might ultimately lie with Satan and Satan only.

"Wait!" I shout, jogging after him. "I'll do it. Whatever it is, I'll do it if it means saving my mom."

"I see," he says quietly, his expression as cryptic as ever. "I guess that means you want to know your next mark."

"Yes," I say, compelled by a newfound eagerness to spare my mother.

"Very well," he says, taking a breath. "It's Craig Tucker."

It rushes back to me: my vision of Craig's death. Suddenly I feel weightless, as though I could drift away at any moment. I can't speak, and my whole body is numb with shock. I feel like I might fall over, and Kenny rushes to my side with a steadying hand. As my Watcher supports me, I can't shake the image, now clear as anything, that was my first premonition after dying. It's not the cancer that gets him. It is a clumsy misstep at the landing of the staircase in his parents' house that sends him spiraling downward to the first floor, tossed by gravity like fresh onions in a summer salad, and when he finally lands, his neck breaks like a chicken bone in the maw of a hyena. Irony can be cruel. Apparently so can fate.

"How do you feel about getting your spirits lifted now?" Kenny asks, weakly attempting to inject levity into the moment. I am too shocked to laugh, but I nod my head _yes_.

"Can we see Stan?" I ask hopefully. He tells me that my best friend's place is nowhere to go if I want my spirits lifted.

"Ike, then?"

"Seeing a movie with your parents. Nothing to see there."

I ponder my remaining options before realizing what I should have chosen all along. Under the present circumstances, a lump catches in my throat when I first try to utter his name, but I work through it, carefully rolling each sound around in my mouth as I say it: "Tweek."

Kenny closes his eyes and nods slowly after a moment. "That will do just fine."

* * *

><p>The scene in Tweek's bedroom seems painfully uneventful when we arrive, and I wonder if Kenny allowed me to come here merely because it was a safe option.<p>

"He's just fucking around online," I mutter, more than a bit disappointed.

"That's what you think," Kenny says, cracking a grin. "Let's expand the picture a bit." He raises his hand, clenches it into a fist, and slowly rotates it in a semi-circle. Suddenly, the room splits in two, with Tweek sitting at his computer on the right and Butters on his tablet on the left. I stare at my Watcher in disbelief. He explains, "They're messaging each other." He snaps his fingers, and text appears above each boy's head as he types. I really have to learn how Kenny does all this cool shit.

Above Butters' head appears the line _Well, have you told him yet?_

Above Tweek, materializing as he types: _Gah, no! The longer I wait, the harder it gets. What if he says no? I don't even know if he's… you know… like I am, in that way._

Butters stares at his screen, unsure how to respond. He thinks on it and replies, _I get that. What's the worst that can happen, though? All he can do is say no._

Tweek: _I know! That's my point!_

Butters: _You can't be scared of rejection, Tweekers. It's not like he'll be mad at you. He'll still be your best friend, no matter what._

Tweek: _It's not just that, I guess. Every time I think about his cancer, I feel hopeless and shitty. Like even if he doesn't say no… well, you know. This fucking sucks all around._

I can tell that Butters has no easy answers here, but how could he? He thinks on it and plays it safe: _No matter what happens, I'm here for you, Tweek._ After he finishes typing, he wipes his eyes. I circle around to get a closer look and realize that he's been crying. A part of me wants to know why, but at this point, I do not have the mental energy to extend my concern to anyone else still living.

The thought of the living reminds me why I am here and what I must do. I look to Tweek and am immediately saddened. I feel Kenny's hand on my shoulder.

"You about ready, Broflovski?" I'm not, but when will I ever be? I nod robotically, following my Watcher out of the room as Butters and his bedroom vanish, leaving behind the lovesick teenager and his computer to the darkness and the solitude.

* * *

><p>"This is where I leave you," Kenny says when we arrive at the Tucker residence. "I mean, I'll still be out here watching, ready to jump in if you need a hand, but I don't think that will be the case. You know what you have to do." He reaches out to shake my hand, which I find an odd gesture, until I realize it's a trick in order to pull me into a hug. "You've got this," he says. "I know you'll do the right thing."<p>

I pull away after the hug, annoyed at his choice of words at the end. As I enter the house undetected, I wonder what _the right thing_ really is in this case. When I asked Kenny why my mark had to be Craig, why it couldn't be someone else, someone anonymous, he told me that that was just how the dice rolled. He wouldn't say anything more.

As I silently float up the seventeen steps to the landing, I get chills at the thought of how the "accident" is going to happen. Since I died, every time I remembered my vision of Craig's death, I always assumed he slipped or tripped over something. Never would I have imagined that he would be pushed down the stairs, let alone by me. As I approach his door, I feel paralyzed as I consider the value of a life, the value of _this_ life, the one I am about to take. I try to rationalize it the same way I have been doing so since I first found out that he was my mark: if I don't kill him, the cancer will. For all I know, he has a long journey ahead of him, full of painful days of suffering, and I am bringing him salvation in the form of death. That's the rose-tinted version that I tell myself, which I can largely accept until I think of Tweek. Fucking Tweek and his teenage heartache, in love with his best friend. Tweek who's had a shitty, stressful life and whose only joy in the world is the boy I will soon kill. Tweek who came within inches of taking his own life when he imagined an existence devoid of his best friend.

I can't do it. If I kill Craig, I'll practically be killing Tweek, too. But I can't _not_ kill Craig, either. If I spare him, then my mother is a goner. My mother, the thinly stretched glue that is holding the remnants of my family together, the only hope that my dad has for getting better. Fuck. I can't let her die. I have to kill Craig.

I drift into his bedroom, feeling worse than I have since my death. I look at him, and he is sleeping, not entirely unlike Buzz before I took him by surprise on his grimy mattress. In order to kill Craig, I know that I must wake him, so I crack his window and draw in a frigid curl of wind. He shoots up straight, aware of how cold it suddenly is. His legs slip out the side of his bed onto the floor, as he first reaches for socks and then a shirt to combat the cold. I know that he must have a reason for going downstairs, so I make him thirsty by drying up his throat to a state of sudden parchedness. He shakes his head and stands up, grabbing a pair of ratty boxers for a modicum of modesty. As he stumbles into the upstairs bathroom, I lock the handle on the sink so that he cannot turn it for a drink. Frustrated, he realizes he must go downstairs to the kitchen to quench his thirst.

I acknowledge as he approaches the landing that I have been going through the motions during the easy parts. The second he nears the top step is a particularly long one, extending well beyond the night itself. When I see him there, I suddenly accept the truth of the matter, which I have successfully kept at bay during the long, preceding minutes: I can't kill Craig. I don't want to, and I can't, and I won't. The cocktail of feelings I feel would make me want to shout and cry and throw things if I were alive, but because I am not, I merely feel a deep-seated unease. I watch as Craig clops down the stairs, safely reaching his destination a few seconds later because I did not give him the fatal push. Before I can think on it any longer, I am gone.

* * *

><p>I awaken to familiar surroundings, immobile in the pits of Hell. When I shout, I fall clumsily like before and once again find Kenny's cryptic glare studying me. I am immediately terrified. I want to ask if my mother is dead yet, if it is too late to go back and finish the deed. I want to apologize and tell the truth, but I can manage no words.<p>

"Nice work, Broflovski," Kenny says, puncturing the heavy silence. "You've passed your test." I stare at my Watcher in stunned silence, and he takes the cue to explain. "You were never intended to kill Craig. In fact, had you gone all the way, I would have stepped in to intervene, but I knew you wouldn't go through with it. You recognized how much was at stake and the damage you would have caused had you done the deed. Oh, and before you freak out, your mother is safe, and she always has been."

"I don't understand. And how did you know that, about me recognizing what was at stake?"

He grins. "Well, I could spin some yarn about how after watching you for a long time, I've developed the ability to read your mind, but I'll just be honest: that thing that Satan rammed up your nose had two purposes. One was to read your empathy levels, which are off the charts, by the way. The second was to plant a thought-reading device in you so that I could track everything that crossed your mind while you were at Craig's. You see, we've been studying you since you died. What they don't tell you at Afterlife Orientation is that every dead person eventually falls into a role that they must fill before going to Heaven—if they choose to go to Heaven, that is. The karmambulator and the numbers and all that is just bullshit. What Satan really cares about is how you perform when you are tested. It's funny: he told me after you fucked up with Stan—which really was a huge fuck-up; I didn't lie about that—that he thought you might make a decent assassin. I laughed but told him I'd be willing to go along with it if he wanted to give you a test. When you were tasked with taking out Buzz, we noticed how aware you were of everything that was happening. It wasn't just a cold-blooded murder. That's why Satan wanted to measure your empathy levels. Believe it or not, empathy is one the most important traits he looks for in a killer. He wants his triggermen to have a strong sense of right and wrong so that they don't end up killing the wrong folks or go about earthly affairs in the wrong way. Craig was your final test. Satan knew that you needed an ethical puzzle, and I gotta say, you solved it beautifully, Broflovski."

"So what does all this mean?" I ask, a million questions swimming in my head.

"It means that Satan wants you as a full-time assassin as long as you're up for the job. Of course, now that you've passed your test, you can go to Heaven anytime you like, and the great thing is that it's an open-door policy. Once you're there, if you ever decide to come back and do a little pro bono killing, that's totally cool with God."

I shake my head, coming to terms with everything that is being said. I laugh because it is the only response that really seems appropriate.

"So Satan wants me to kill people?"

"Yes, but only people who truly deserve it. You'll never have to deal with another Craig-type situation. You'll be dealing primarily in folks like Buzz."

I nod, lost in the surreality of it all. "I need to think about it."

"Fair enough," Kenny says, patting me on the back. "Whenever you're ready, go talk to The Big Man. He's already told me that you're free to go whenever you want, but he hopes you'll consider sticking around. He told me you're the most promising assassin he's seen in a long, long time. Before you do that, though, there's something I want to show you back on earth."

* * *

><p>As I've mentioned before, time moves differently for us than it does for the living. As a result, people like me don't often think in terms of how time works on earth. It is perhaps for this reason—and perhaps because of everything that's been on my mind lately—that I completely forgot that it is Ike's birthday. Kenny, who, as always, is completely on top of things, escorts me to the party at the Broflovski house, where several of Ike's friends have assembled for a good time. After cake and gifts and video games, the group of preteen boys shuffles to the basement, where they will no doubt stay up late and have an excellent time, taking Ike's mind off of the fact that his brother is not there to celebrate with him this year. In my place is Butters, who, because he is much older than the other attendees, spends most of the time chatting with my mother and updating her on Ike's progress.<p>

After the group of boys migrates downstairs and Butters waves goodbye for the night, my parents retire upstairs to their bedroom, where my mother settles in with a romance novel on her e-reader and my father tries to drift off to sleep after downing a pour of scotch. Suddenly there is a gentle knocking at the front door, and I look to Kenny, puzzled.

"I have no idea what that's about," he says. "I just brought you here for a birthday party."

The noise jolts my father back to full consciousness. He exchanges a glance with my mother and then turns to slip into a pair of loafers.

"I wonder who that could be," my mother says.

"Probably just one of the boys' parents," my dad says, more irritated than anything. "I'll investigate."

Kenny and I slink down the stairs invisibly, my father unknowingly following a few steps behind.

My father opens the door, and there is Stan, shaking. He is carrying some kind of small gym bag in one hand and asks if he can come in. When Stan steps into the foyer, my father notices that the bag is unzipped, and he sees a small pistol inside, nestled in some wrinkled clothes. His eyes go wide, and in the moment when meets Stan's gaze, he sees that the boy does not have any harmful intent, at least not to anyone in the Broflovski house.

"Who is it?" my mother asks from upstairs.

"Nobody," my father replies instinctively. "They had the wrong house." He adds, "I think I'm going to watch some TV. Don't feel like sleeping now that I'm up."

"Okay, I'll see you in the morning, then," my mom says, closing the bedroom door so that the TV will not keep her awake.

My father makes sure the door to the basement is closed, as well. He takes Stan into the kitchen, and they sit at the table. Stan cries and explains that he didn't have anyone else to talk to, that he didn't feel comfortable discussing it with his parents. He misses me a lot, he admits, and he can't stop drinking. He wants to kill himself, and he brought the gun along in case he felt like going through with it this time. But he couldn't, he decided, at least not tonight.

My father hugs him. He cries a bit himself. He takes the gun from Stan and says he will dispose of it. He asks Stan if he'd stay for a while and drink a cup of coffee. He puts on a pot to brew and sits back down beside my friend. They talk for hours. My dad tells Stan that it's okay to be sad, that sometimes—more often than not these days—he's really sad, too. He says that my death hasn't been easy on anyone and that he's not surprised it's been so hard on Stan. He says that he knows it will get easier but that it will take time, maybe lots of time. These are things that need to be said and need to be heard.

They drink the whole pot of coffee, and Stan sleeps on the couch. My father decides he will explain everything to my mom in the morning. In the meantime, he sleeps. He goes upstairs and joins her, embracing her in the night. As he drifts off, he hopes something clicks for Stan like he realizes has just clicked for him.

It is all so much. I turn to Kenny. I am in awe.

* * *

><p><em>Thanks for reading! <em>

_If it seems like there is still a lot up in the air, have no fear, for all will be resolved in the epilogue. If you are so inclined, please leave a review. Writers love reviews, and I am no different._

_Cheers,_

_TEPR_


	6. Epilogue

_Hi there! _

_First, I want to thank everyone who's stuck around with this story to the bittersweet end. The epilogue features a concentrated dose of existential pondering; I figured it would only be fitting for this elegy to close with a meditation on life and death. Thanks again for your continued support of this story and my writing. It means the world to me._

_Happy readings!_

_TEPR_

* * *

><p>The longer you are dead, the disparity between earth time and afterlife time becomes easier to understand but not always easier to reconcile. On the plus side, the entirety of history's collective memory is at my disposal 247. Thanks to the power of shapeshifting, I am able to go anywhere and be anyone I want whenever it suits me. It's allowed me to experience a whole slew of things I never could have imagined when I was alive. For example, recently I learned that the Mayans invited a primitive sport that was like a combination of basketball and soccer. They took that shit seriously, too. Just the other day I watched a game in which the captain of the losing team was decapitated after the final score was called. Later I met him at a mixer in Heaven—pretty cool dude. Since he'd been dead so long, I asked what about the modern world fascinated him the most. He shrugged and said it didn't seem like that much time since he'd passed but that he thought big-screen TVs were pretty badass. To each his own, I suppose.

I really do think I'm starting to get a handle on this time thing. When you're alive, you experience time as linear, moving in one direction only. But time doesn't just plow forward for the dead like it does for the living. We can experience time not only forwards and backwards but also in other ways that you'll understand when you're with us on the other side.

Not that I spend all of my days at afterlife parties or leisurely time-hopping. After all, being an assassin isn't all fun and games. Satan was thrilled, of course, when I told him I'd try my hand at being a professional killer. After Kenny laid on the flattery so thickly, I assumed I'd be pretty good at it, but what I didn't expect was that I'd actually enjoy it. I blew my first mark out of the water (figuratively and, amusingly enough, literally), a malicious West African warlord who Kenny nicknamed General Douchemuffin. After I successfully killed the Scum of Sierra Leone (Satan's less juvenile nickname for the warlord) and demonstrated my pleasure in doing so, Satan lit up like a Christmas tree, fetching a round of cigars for himself, me, and Kenny. Prissy little Gaston, ever the dandy, politely abstained.

Since then, I've earned a couple more notches in my belt, taking down a corrupt two-bit detective and an abysmally vacuous pop star. Kenny especially enjoyed watching that last one, though he assured me that he was only tagging along for the sport of it. After all, once I passed the Craig test, I graduated from having Kenny as my Watcher. From that moment on, I've been a free agent, though Kenny does sometimes hang around. It's partly for my sanity and partly for his own, I think. As you might imagine, the afterlife can be quite boring if you go it alone. This is especially true when you have nothing but time—in all its forms—on your hands.

It is in my moments of solitude that I am most aware of the enormity of time. When I am not busy with an assignment or fucking around with Kenny or meeting new people, I revel in the solitude that life after death affords me. I reflect on things that have happened and things that have yet to happen, and it is all so beautiful. Whenever I return to earth, I watch the world unfold from the other side of a one-way mirror, the living never the wiser than I am there with them, sharing in their moments large and small. Traversing the swamps of time, I see so much.

I see myself the day my parents adopt Ike, my small, gentle face bright with wonder and curiosity as I breathe in this new person who will expand our family. I see myself the day I die, startled by the ugliness of it all. I see myself on a playground with Stan, age seven; I am so happy, and so is he.

I look beyond the past to the future. I see my brother pass the bar, get married, and carry on the family name. My parents could not be prouder of him.

I see Stan drop out of college junior year, not because of failure but to devote himself entirely to a business venture that, though ultimately unsuccessful, teaches him a lot about life and what he wants from it. Like the rest of them, he learns, and that is what truly matters.

I see my father holding my mother when she finally goes—natural causes, age 84. He can only be but so resilient and follows her not long after. It's sweet, really.

There is so much to see that, even with the immense expanse of time before me, I'm not sure that I'll ever experience all of it. There is so much life, past and present and future, and the burden of watching it unfold secondhand is almost too much sometimes. What is most striking to me and what almost always lifts me up, though, is the immediacy of the present—even when it's not particularly pretty. But it is always real and often surprising, and that is what (metaphorically speaking) takes my breath away.

Craig's cancer goes into remission two months after I don't push him down that flight of stairs. When, less than a year later, it is finally declared to be gone, he is filled with a sense of newness and possibility that he did not think was possible. He sheds many tears—also unexpected—but not nearly as many as his best friend, the blonde lovesick teenager who, on the night of his sixteenth birthday, finally comes out to Craig and tells him how he feels. It is a tender, embarrassing moment that Kenny and I discreetly watch unfold from the other side of the room. Craig blushes and leans over to give Tweek an unexpected peck on the lips before scooting back to his spot on the floor and saying that he's pretty sure he's straight but figured he owed his best friend at least one kiss for all he's gone through.

Butters continues to help Ike to get back on track, tutoring him three days a week after school until my brother no longer needs the help. My parents don't know how to repay Butters for his kindnesses, but they are unaware that he got something very important out of the arrangement, too: a feeling of usefulness and a connection that boosted his self-esteem at a time when needed it the most. It is a few weeks after he has stopped coming around to my parents' house that Butters finally accepts the fact that he likes other boys and tells the only person he trusts not to freak out: the only other gay boy he knows. What begins as a friendship of necessity, a pairing of disparate personalities who only share two things in common (their sexual orientation and the color of their hair), slowly simmers into something more over the years. It is not until sophomore year of college that they actually begin dating and not until a few years after graduation that they finally get married. Of course, Craig is Tweek's best man.

After his long chat with Stan in the kitchen, over shared coffee and confiscated firearms, my father begins the healing process by acknowledging his grief about my death. He finally accepts my mother's invitation to attend counseling and, just like he told my best friend in those early morning hours, things slowly begin to improve, and not just for the Broflovskis. After Stan leaves that morning from his makeshift bed on my parents' sofa, my father and mother start asking him to come around more often. At first it is just for dinner once in a while, but before long, he is there with increasing regularity, playing video games with Ike on Sunday afternoons and babysitting when my parents leave town for romantic weekend getaways. My father even employs him as a part-time gofer at his law firm, and it gives Stan an additional outlet his last two years of high school. Soon enough, my best friend is invited along on family vacations, and his sustained presence in the Broflovski house honors my memory in a way that also allows all of them to move on.

I make time for moments like these when I can, when I'm not murdering someone or busy learning a new afterlife trick from Kenny or popping into Heaven to pamper myself with a spa day. Sometimes it's easy to get wrapped up in the affairs of the living, but I keep myself at a remove as much as possible. After all, these are their lives to live, and I know I'll see them all again soon enough, as they trickle in at their own pace, ended by cancer and heart disease and suicide and all manner of tragic accidents. All of them will eventually join me on the other side, beginning again in their own lives after death.

But that is enough existential pondering for now. I must go see Gaston to debrief before my next assignment, and then it's off to happy hour with Kenny and Marilyn. And tomorrow is another day for this afterlife assassin. I have all the time in the world on my hands as I barrel into the past and future, as I waltz steadfast into the here and now.

* * *

><p><em>Thank you to everyone who read this story, especially those who have provided feedback. For those of you who have not reviewed yet, now would be a wonderful time to do that, and I would love to know what you thought of this story. <em>

_It's been my first foray into supernatural fiction, and I have been surprised by and enjoyed all the interesting new places it's taken me as an author. If you enjoyed reading it half as much I enjoyed writing it, then I think my mission is complete._

_Until we meet again!_

_TEPR_


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